


Oh Deer

by Fearful_little_thing



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Animals, Anthropomorphic, Cannibalism - Kinda, Deer!Stiles, Dubious Consent, Fanart, Good Peter Hale, Interspecies, Knotting, M/M, Not always chronological, Omega Stiles Stilinski, Stalking, Wolf!Derek, first fic in this fandom, semi-explicit flashbacks, sort of full frontal nudity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-29
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2018-12-21 05:13:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11937033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fearful_little_thing/pseuds/Fearful_little_thing
Summary: "Are you telling me you were following me because you want me for your mate?"The concept seemed ludicrous, but the wolf smiled at him, eyes crinkling at the corners with genuine pleasure. "Would you consider a wolf for a mate?"-----Stiles wakes up in the aftermath of his heat to find himself in a somewhat disturbing situation, and inevitably winds up deciding that curiosity always wins out over self preservation instincts. Or maybe it doesn't. After all, safety in numbers... or you could just mate with a wolf.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this weirdness hanging around in my head for months and only recently got the courage to do anything about it. This is my first fic in this fandom (and it's an omegaverse anthro-animal au, oh my god) as well as my first time posting to AO3, so please forgive me if I mess up the formatting. 
> 
> I have more ideas for this verse. Many more, so let me know if it's worth exploring. Like all creators, I feed on praise.
> 
> Hopefully the writing itself makes it obvious, but in this world it is not at all normal for creatures of different species to be attracted to one another.
> 
> Also, ignore the fact that the wolf!Derek illustration clearly shows him standing in a forest when the text says otherwise.

 

When he first woke it was to the unfamiliar sensation of thick, warm fur beneath his cheek, softer and thicker than his own. Long fur, too long to belong to any fellow deer. It covered his legs too. Soft, draped over the contours of his calves, pooling in unnatural folds. A blanket made of animal fur. Animal fur, when his own bedding was moss and woven grasses.

 

The realisation startled him properly awake.

 

Stiles bolted up, sitting upright in the middle of the nest of furs he found himself in.

 

The movement set off a series of aches and pains in his body. His legs ached like he'd been running too fast for too long, the muscles of his stomach protesting as if he'd recently put them through a too-vigorous work out. His hips and buttocks felt bruised and there was an insistent throbbing in a far more private area that told him that he'd likely had sex. Rough sex, he mused a little uneasily, shifting his weight onto one hip so he could reach gingerly behind himself to rub the pad of a finger over his hole. It felt hot and swollen, still somewhat slick with bodily fluids. There was no tearing though, and when he inspected his fingers there was no trace of blood. Whoever he'd been with had been careful enough not to actually hurt him, even if the sex had clearly been vigorous enough to leave him in such a state.

 

Not Jackson then, Stiles thought with some satisfaction and no small amount of relief.

 

Not him, or any of the other young stags in the herd. They wouldn't have cared about hurting him – in fact they would have enjoyed it if they had. They'd made that clear enough in the past. Enough so that he'd spent all of his previous heats locked away in secret, guarded by his father to make certain that no young buck could get past to mount him.

 

Thinking about his father made his chest feel tight, his loss a vicelike grip around his heart. He dismissed the feeling as quickly as he could, pushing the grief aside to concentrate on his current situation in these unfamiliar surroundings.

 

Stiles looked around himself with cautious curiosity, inching carefully towards the edge of the fur bedding. He was in a cave of some sort, its ceiling high enough that even the tallest of the stags in his herd could easily stand upright without their antlers brushing the stone. The floor was smooth, brushed clean and free of dirt or stray dead leaves. The walls worn smooth by the ages, except for a few nooks and hollows that had been carved into makeshift shelves that held baskets woven from grass and reeds – contents unknown.

 

There was a faint smoky smell in the air, along with clear traces of another creature. Not anyone from his herd, Stiles thought to himself, sniffing the air as he tried to identify the scent. An alpha of some kind, definitely. The smell was too masculine to be anything else, heavy with musk and a hint of something that had the fur on his back rising, something that said 'danger'.

 

Not a stag, Stiles realised, feeling his heart begin to pound faster. Not any kind of deer at all.

 

His feet touched the cave floor. He stood on wobbly legs, arms out, short tail twitching in a futile attempt to help his balance. One ankle throbbed, telling him that he'd hurt it sometime within the past twenty-four hours.

 

Twisted in a fall, the memory came to him suddenly, though fuzzy and indistinct. He'd been running and he'd fallen, tripped over something that caught on his ankle and hurt enough that he'd cried out in pain even though he'd been trying so hard to be quiet.

 

He'd been running from Jackson – Stiles remembered. Running from him and his alpha friends, the young bucks who'd promised to breed the herd's lone omega male, to mount him this heat, to finally get him and give him what he deserved now that he didn't have his father around to protect him. So when he'd hurt his ankle he'd still been coherent enough to run, smart enough to know that he had to get away from the herd if he wanted to get through this heat unscathed.

 

Only then he'd been hurt, and then someone – _something_ – had caught him anyway. 

 

The cave's entrance was around a small bend, enough light coming in that it was easy to see. Stiles moved towards it, limping a little, heart beating too fast with adrenaline and fear. He had to figure out where he was in the forest, if it was somewhere he knew. He had to get back to the herd, back to where it was safe, now that his heat was over and his mind wasn't muddled by hormones and biological imperatives.

 

Now that the young bucks who'd threatened to mount him would have to work a lot harder for it with Stiles in his right mind, fully aware, and able to bite and scratch if they tried to hurt him. He may not have a rack of antlers like they did, but teeth could do just as much damage up close and a headbutt from his small 'omega doe-horns' wasn't anything to laugh about either.

 

Omega stags were rare, but they weren't all the pathetic, delicate little flowers the herd thought they were. They couldn't be. Stiles himself was proof of that.

 

True, he was smaller than the other bucks, lithe and slender like the does, but that only meant he was faster than the heavier, bulkier stags. Instead of a rack of antlers he had two small, pointed horns. His markings were more feminine, his belly and thighs creamy white, so the other bucks assumed he was feminine. He had heats like a doe, could bear children like a doe, but that didn't make him pathetic or delicate.

 

Even so, it was perfectly natural for him to squeak in surprised fear at the figure that appeared in the cave entrance.

 

A wolf, tall and broad shouldered, dark fur covering his muscular arms.

 

Stiles scrambled backwards, injured ankle protesting with sparks of pain, eyes darting around the cave in a useless attempt to find another way out. Teeth and horns were good enough for other deer – they'd do nothing to deter the wolf with its sharp fangs and claws made for ripping flesh.

 

"It's ok," the wolf said, his voice pitched low and soothing, hands held palms up towards the frightened deer. "I wont hurt you. I haven't."

 

"You're a wolf!" Stiles barked in protest, eyes wide as he felt his back hit the cave wall, cool stone preventing him from backing up any further.

 

The wolf's mouth twitched, tail swishing gently through the air behind him. "You're observant," he said, sounding unfairly amused.

 

The wolf took a step forward, bringing himself into the cave properly. Out of the glare of the sunlight Stiles could see that his face was handsome, his eyes an odd light colour somewhere between green and blue and brown. Heterochromia, the word unhelpfully jumped into his panicked brain.

 

"It's alright, omega stag," the wolf purred at him, slowly creeping closer, "do you remember where you are? You're in my den. And I haven't hurt you."

 

"But you could," Stiles protested weakly, instincts screaming danger as the predator approached. "You've got claws – fangs – you – you think I'm gonna fall for this 'I wont hurt you' crap? Wolves _eat_ deer!"

 

Stiles' mouth snapped shut. It had occurred to him only as he was speaking that maybe he shouldn't have said that. It seemed too much like asking for it to remind the wolf that he was a prey animal, that creatures like him were food for creatures like the wolf.

 

"Why would I eat you?" the wolf asked with a small (and to Stiles' mind, vaguely sinister) smile. He was close enough to touch now, and reached out with a gentle hand to brush a single claw down Stiles' cheek, the touch barely firm enough to ruffle the fine, thin fur on his face.

 

Memory sparked, and the deer flushed.

 

_He was caught in a hunter's trap, dull metal teeth biting into his flesh hard enough that he couldn't pull free. His body was flushed with heat, pheromone rich sweat beading on his skin beneath his fur, slick fluid beginning to seep from his hole to wet the fur of his inner thighs. He ached all over, his body begging for touch while his ankle throbbed painfully in the trap. He was making noises, soft, pleading calls from deep in his throat._

_Leaves rustled nearby, the wolf slinking through the trees towards him, making no move to mask the sound of his approach. A voice, softer than he expected, dripping with curiosity and interest. "What have we here?"_

_"Please," he pleaded, not sure what he was asking for exactly. Did he want mercy, for the wolf to leave him alone? A swift, painless death? Or did he want the wolf to free him so he could look for a stag to mount him?_

_Gentle, clawed hands touched his flanks, fingers running along his fur as the wolf circled him. The deer's tail lifted, his back arching, and another option suddenly occurred to him. "Please," he said again, almost a sob, as the wolf sank down to kneel in front of him and examine the hunter's trap that had caught him._

_Claws clicked against metal. "Shhh," the wolf soothed, looking up at him with eyes gone dark with intent. "Omega... I'll get you out. I'll help you."_

_"D-don't eat me," he pleaded, aware enough to know that wolves were dangerous, and that the look in the wolf's eyes may not mean good things for him. "Don't hurt me, please."_

_"Why would I eat you?" the wolf asked, leaning in to nuzzle the deer's thigh. The wolf breathed in deep, sniffing his way up to the crease where thigh met groin, nosing through the soft fur._

 

Stiles blinked, his eyes wide, mouth hanging slightly open as he rolled the memory around in his mind. He stared at the wolf, gaze darting between the alpha wolf's claws and his eyes. Soft eyes. Soft touch. Stiles swallowed. "We had sex," he said, only a little hesitantly. "You freed me from a hunter's trap, then you brought me back here and..."

 

"We had sex," the wolf agreed with a nod.

 

"Why?"

 

"Because you were in heat, and I wanted to."

 

"No," Stiles shook his head, still staring at the wolf. "I mean... why did you even free me in the first place? Why didn't you want to eat me? You're a wolf – a predator – in case you hadn't noticed, and I'm a deer. An _omega_ deer, even, a deer without defences! And while we're at it, ok, I also don't understand why you wanted to have sex with me. As far as I know nobody looks at another species and just says to themselves 'you know what, I want to have sex with that'. We're totally biologically incompatible. It'd make sense if you could get me pregnant, since that's what heats are for and I guess even wolves feel the seasonal urge for procreation, but you can't! So why would you even care that I was in heat in the first place instead of just looking at me like I was a nice, convenient snack that couldn't run away?"

 

Stiles stopped speaking, abruptly realising that he'd started getting louder and faster as he went, leaning forwards a little and squinting at the wolf as he practically demanded that the other creature answer his questions. He'd gotten right in the wolf's face, was even pointing at him, finger poised as if he were going to poke the wolf in the chest for emphasis.

 

The wolf arched one thick black eyebrow and glanced down at that pointing finger before pointedly looking back up at Stiles' face. He backed up a step, then casually indicated the fur bedding that the deer had woken up in. "You should sit down," he advised, "you're still healing. You shouldn't be on that ankle yet."

 

"You're not going to answer me?" _Or maul me for asking?_ Stiles added silently, deeply confused by both the wolf's behaviour so far and what little he could remember of it from before.

 

"Sit down and I'll tell you," the wolf offered, mouth curved into a small smirk as if already knew that curiosity was the perfect way to get Stiles to go against his instincts as a prey animal and willingly sit on a wolf's bed.

 

The deer hesitated only a moment, deeply disappointed in his survival instincts, then moved cautiously to sit on the edge of the furs nearest the wall. He leaned back against the stone, legs stretched out in front of him, watching the wolf all the while. Sitting, he couldn't help but notice, helped his ankle a lot but also emphasised the tender ache of his hole. He bit his bottom lip, blushing when he saw the wolf's eyes dart down to his lap knowingly.

 

"Alright," Stiles said as boldly as he could, deciding he might as well brazen his way through whatever this was. "I'm sitting. Spill, wolfy."

 

The wolf's mouth twitched into another smirk. "Derek," he said, finally giving Stiles a name to work with. "And you're Stiles."

 

"Did I tell you that?"

 

"No. I heard the other deer call you that. Those bucks you ran from," Derek clarified after a moment, crouching down on his haunches near the bedding, tail brushing the ground behind him. Stiles couldn't help it when his eyes were drawn to the bulge between the alpha wolf's spread legs, thick black fur covering a pair of weighty balls, cock soft and hidden by its sheath – only a little different from the anatomy an alpha stag. (Or his own. A thought that made him blush deeper.)

 

Stiles dragged his eyes away, back to the wolf's face as he tried to focus on what Derek had said rather than the big, muscular (dangerous) body on display in front of him. "You were there?" he asked, surprised.

 

"I was out hunting when I smelled deer," Derek explained easily. "A small group, separate from their herd. I thought I'd found prey, so I came closer. I heard them threatening to chase you down. They were saying you'd sing a different tune when one of them caught you and mounted you. They called you a mouthy omega, said you thought you were too good for anyone. One of them said he'd show you your place."

 

"Jackson," Stiles provided dryly, able to recall the threats and promises as easily as if they were happening right then. "He's hated me since we were kids. I don't know why he thinks mounting me would do anything but make me want to break off his rack and stab him with his own antlers."

 

Derek shrugged, the fur on his shoulders rippling with the movement and drawing attention to the muscles of his arms and chest. "I figured you didn't want any of them. You ran. Fast. They couldn't keep up. You outran me too. It took me a while to follow your scent and when I caught up to you, you were trapped."

 

"You followed me, but you didn't want to eat me," Stiles said bluntly, an observation rather than a question. The only reason his voice wasn't dripping with skepticism because he was clearly alive and uneaten.

 

"You're an omega," Derek replied simply, "your scent was so sweet. Up close you smelled like want. I wanted to roll in your scent. You're small, and pretty, and I wanted you the way an alpha wants an omega."

 

"You're a _wolf_ ," Stiles repeated dumbly, "and I'm a _deer_."

 

"You weren't complaining when I mounted you," the wolf pointed out, looking quite pleased with himself when Stiles flushed pink under his fur again. "You weren't complaining when we had sex."

 

"I -" Memory sparked again, another fuzzy, heat-addled moment becoming clear in his mind.

 

_The bedding was soft beneath his hands and knees, fur tickling between his fingers. It felt good, though it was strange to be touching fur that was no longer attached to the animal it had belonged to. It smelled like alpha, like the wolf that had carried him here._

_He spread his legs further in invitation, back arching, tail lifting to present to the wolf that was touching him so sweetly on his thighs and hips. There was a rumbling growl from behind him – an unfamiliar sound, but one that he instinctually knew was good. It meant the wolf was pleased, that he wanted him. Clawed hands gripped his hips firmly and he braced himself to be mounted for the first time only to cry out in surprise when instead a broad, wet tongue licked over his entrance. The wolf lapped at his hole, tasting the slick fluid that was leaking from him, the tip of the muscle catching against his rim now and then in a way that made him ache for more._

 

"I... You know I can't bear your pups," Stiles said, pushing the memory away even as his hole twitched at the remembered sensations. "It doesn't make _sense_ for you to want me."

 

"I don't care about pups," Derek told him frankly. He dropped down to all fours, looking suddenly predatory, dangerous in a way that made the deer's heart start to pound.

 

Stiles should be afraid, but the instinctive thrill of fear was tempered by a curl of sudden arousal at the memory of the alpha wolf's touch.

 

"I don’t want a wolf for a mate," Derek continued, slinking towards Stiles with slow, sinuous movements, tail swaying through the air behind him. "She-wolf, omega wolf, I don't care. I don't want them. I want a mate I can care for and protect," he said, voice low as he crawled up over the deer's outstretched legs. "I want a mate that will trust me not to eat them, that knows I'll never hurt them and will protect them from other animals that eat meat. I want a pretty deer," he finished, his face inches away from Stiles', their eyes locked.

 

Stiles stared, face flushed, eyes wide, looking into the oddly beautiful eyes of a creature that could easily kill him. His eyes flicked quickly down to the wolf's mouth – plush pink lips hiding a maw full of deadly sharp teeth – and felt the absurd desire to feel those lips on his. He could remember that mouth on his body, fangs just barely grazing his skin. It probably wasn't particularly wise of him to want to feel that mouth on him again.

 

"Are you telling me you were following me because you want me for your mate?"

 

The concept seemed ludicrous, but the wolf smiled at him, eyes crinkling at the corners with genuine pleasure. "Would you consider a wolf for a mate?" Derek asked him softly, seemingly in direct contrast to the way he had the deer boxed in by his body, sitting on his bed of furs, pressed up against the wall with nowhere to go.

 

They'd been closer than this though, Stiles thought.

 

_He writhed on the furs, cock dripping, balls drawn up tight as his hole spasmed around the thick, hard flesh that speared him open. The wolf was pressed up against him, chest to his back, his tail trapped against the wolf's stomach. He could feel the wolf circle his hips in short, abortive thrusts that rubbed their bodies together in all the right ways. He knew what was happening, could feel the pressure inside of him growing as the wolf's knot expanded to lock them together. A sensation he never would have experienced with another deer, not even with an alpha stag who instead would have kept going through multiple orgasms instead of tying them together. The wolf had done this once before already, and the omega had come so hard it had almost hurt before enjoying being petted and cuddled. He wanted that again. Wanted to lie with the wolf on their sides, safe and sated until the next time his body demanded that he be mounted again._

 

Stiles opened his mouth, then closed it again.

 

His father was gone, he thought to himself, the thought coming (as always) with a little dart of grief. His father, the proud gray stag who had once been his protector within the herd, was gone. The alpha stag who led them was nice enough, but indifferent towards the lone omega male. Stiles didn't have any family left in the herd, and the friends he had weren't particularly close ones, kept away by Jackson and the other young alphas that considered Stiles an easy target to pick on. If the wolf hadn't caught him then one of those stags would have, and Stiles would likely have wound up pregnant – saddled with a fawn that he didn't want to a stag that would have refused to take responsibility and claim him for a lifemate.

 

The wolf, on the other hand, had rescued him from a hunter's trap.

 

Derek had taken him back to his den and seen him through his heat without hurting him. From what Stiles remembered he'd been careful with him, the aches in his body only from the frequency and enthusiasm of their coupling... And the strange stretch of the wolf's knot, something that Stiles' body wasn't naturally made to accomodate. His claws had prickled against the deer's skin but had never come close to hurting him. Neither had his teeth.

 

And Derek was offering to protect and care for him. Derek was asking to be his mate.

 

If Stiles remembered correctly, wolves mated for life.

 

"If you say no," Derek told him, "I'll take you back through the forest to your herd. I wont hurt you. I promise I'll never hurt you, even if you say no to me."

 

Strangely, despite the lingering prey-animal instinct in the back of his mind, Stiles actually believed him.

 

Slowly, carefully, he raised a hand until he could touch the alpha wolf, cupping his cheek to feel the soft, barely there fur on his face that bled seamlessly into longer, shaggier fur at the sides of his head. Derek's eyes closed at the touch, head tilting to nuzzle his nose against the deer's wrist.

 

It was nice. A gesture of affection that left the deer feeling warm rather than afraid.

 

"I need a little time to think about it," Stiles said finally, even as he found himself carding his fingers through the longer fur near the wolf's ears. "Can I think about it? I just... I think I trust that you wont hurt me, but I don't want to make any big life-changing choices without at least thinking about the consequences. I mean, I don't even know anything about you – you don't really know anything about me! What if we're not compatible? Even aside from the whole wolf-deer thing. What would your pack say? Do you even have a pack, by the way? Are they cool with you mating an omega deer or would they, like, try to eat me when you're not around to stop them? There's a lot to consider here."

 

Derek smiled at him, seemingly amused by his rambling questions. He leaned in and nuzzled Stiles' cheek, then backed up and flopped onto his side on the bed of furs. The move gave Stiles his personal space back, which was both a relief and a disappointment to him.On the other hand it meant that Stiles could watch as the wolf stretched out onto his back, arms up above his head, unselfconsciously putting his body on display for the omega to look at if he wanted to.

 

It was an attractive body. A very attractive body, though it was unnatural to think so. Derek had no antlers. His tail was long and plumed instead of short and tufted. He was the wrong colour, his fur ranging from inky blackon his shoulders and back to a lighter tan in the areas where it was fine and thin. His ears were pointed, his teeth sharp, wicked claws tipping each of his fingers (and even his toes).

 

Stiles shouldn't find him attractive. Shouldn't be thinking about how he knew how big and thick the wolf's cock was when it was hard, or how his muscles felt beneath Stiles' palms...

 

The deer swallowed, forcing himself to look away before his body betrayed him.

 

"I have a pack," Derek confirmed, politely ignoring the faint hint of arousal in the deer's scent. "A small one. They know how I feel about mates. They wont say anything, and they wont eat you." He looked at Stiles, who was still sitting there with his back propped against the cave wall. "I can introduce you to them if you want to stay a while."

 

"... I don't know if I should," Stiles said to his toes, hands twisting together on his lap as he thought it over. It wasn't like he really had anyone worrying about him back at the herd. Nobody would really care if he didn't show up for a few days. "I don't... what would I eat, if I stayed? I'm not really designed for... uh... for a carnivore's diet."

 

"You eat fish don't you?"

 

Stiles shrugged. "Sometimes. Mostly it's fruit, vegetables, plants – whatever's available at the time. Nuts are good too," he added after a moment, "and bark will do in a pinch, but I'd rather not go chewing on your local trees if I can avoid it."

 

"We have a garden," Derek informed him.

 

"A garden," Stiles repeated, surprised. He, like most prey-animals, tended not to imagine what else predators might eat except for meat. The concept of a wolf gardening was so utterly bizarre to him that he couldn't help but shake his head in bemusement. "You have a garden?"

 

"I told you, I wanted a deer. If I want a herbivore for a mate I should be able to provide for them. Besides... we like plants too sometimes," he said, lips curled into a smile, "us wolves. Like you deer eat fish. Sometimes."

 

Stiles took a moment to consider that, mulling over the implications of what the wolf had said.

 

A garden – if there really was one – implied commitment to this strange idea of choosing a deer for a lifemate. It would have required time and effort to cultivate, with more time and effort to ensure that the plants were cared for and didn't die for lack of water. A garden implied forethought, proving that Derek had indeed thought about how exactly he'd look after a non-wolf mate past simply defending them from physical threats. It meant that this wasn't just some spur of the moment thing for him. That it wasn't just a wolf deciding to find out what it felt like to screw around outside his own species.

 

From a purely physical standpoint it was obvious that Stiles fit the wolf's requirements for a potential mate. He was the right species. Presumably he was the right gender – at least right enough to have sex with – and adequately attractive. Being an omega meant that he wasn't as outwardly aggressive as other males, without a rack of antlers to impale the wolf with, and came with the bonus of self-lubrication when aroused. Something that made them more physically compatible than had Stiles been a beta or alpha stag.

 

Whether or not they were compatible in other ways was yet to be seen.

 

Stiles looked at the wolf, frowning slightly as he considered his options.

 

He could leave. It might be stupid of him, but he actually believed Derek when he said he'd take him back to his herd. So Stiles could leave and go back to the herd, where there was safety in numbers and he'd be amongst his own kind... If largely ignored except for a couple of younger does who saw him as an honorary female and the young alpha bucks who liked making him feel hunted.

 

In the herd, his brain reminded him unhelpfully, his mating prospects were pretty dismal, and chances were good he'd eventually wind up pregnant to some alpha who may or may not decide to mate him properly.

 

Maybe there _was_ something wrong with him, but the more he thought about it the more attractive the idea of staying a while became. Clearly he was deeply disturbed, his instincts for danger defective. That was surely the only explanation for what he was thinking.

 

Stiles crawled back onto the furs next to Derek. He lay down on his front beside the wolf, propped up on his elbows.

 

"So," he said after a moment. "You'll introduce me to your pack later? Make sure none of them try to eat me?"

 

"I promise they won't try to eat you."

 

"They're a pack of wolves, pal. I'm allowed to be wary."

 

Derek's eyes crinkled in amusement. "Does this mean you're staying?" he asked, rolling onto his side to better look at the deer beside him.

 

"For a while. Maybe." Stiles shrugged, then leaned over to nudge the wolf with his shoulder. "To see what it's like... You know, take a look at this garden of yours, get to know you a bit more than as just Derek, that wolf I had sex with a few times when I was in heat. Speaking of, I'm still sore by the way."

 

"I'm sorry." Derek did not sound the least bit sorry at all, and in fact looked a little bit pleased with himself. His tail wagged twice, thumping against the furs, then stilled.

 

Stiles was probably a moron for thinking that was kind of cute. (Though it did help that he could distinctly remember the wolf cuddling him from behind while they were tied together, nuzzling the back of his neck and petting him with gentle hands. Not the sort of thing a dangerous beast was supposed to do to a helpless creature like himself.)

 

"So," he said after a moment's silence. "Tell me about your pack."

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Derek stalks his prey, Stiles has his first meeting with the Pack, and a garden is explored.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It looks like any updates to this work are going to happen in the form of chapters that are more like self-contained short stories. Which means there may be time jumps, and future additions may not be perfectly chronological.
> 
> Tags will be added as new themes arise.

**Then**

 

Once upon a time the pack had been twenty strong. A large pack, all of them family in one way or another. By blood or by bond. Derek's mother had been the alpha of their pack – a wise leader with unmatched strength of will. She had to have that strength. Her lifemate's seed had given her two alpha children one after the other, one female and one male barely more than a year apart. Raising two headstrong alpha pups was a chore all on its own, doing that and taking care of a larger pack took the kind of fortitude that was rarely found in the average wolf.

 

Talia most certainly had not been average.

 

But she was dead now. As were most of the twenty wolves that belonged to the pack Derek had grown up in. There were only two of them left now. Just two, each of them baring scars both visible and not.

 

Derek weaved carefully through the trees, crouched low and out of sight, feet padding silent against the forest floor. He shouldn't be here in this part of the woods. Not alone. If he was caught sniffing around the edges of these few grassy clearings there would be trouble. A single buck alone, maybe even two or three, he could handle easily. An entire herd of sharp antlers and angry fists was another thing entirely.

 

The inky black wolf paused to sniff the air, nose up, eyes sinking half closed. He tilted his head slightly and listened.

 

Grass swished against fur in the clearing ahead, the long stalks brushed aside by creatures moving, milling around in the sunlight. He could hear the idle chatter of young, content creatures and the distant sounds of children playing, watched over by their parents or elder members of the herd. Deer musk perfumed the air. A mix of male and female scents, old, young, the milky smell of new mothers and the earthy musk of alpha stags, all of it mixed together to form a picture of the herd.

 

He could pick it apart if he wanted to. Could figure out by scent alone which ones were weak or sick. He could find the young ones, fawns too old to be amused by children's games but too young to be included by the young adults, and lure them out to be eaten.

 

If he'd had the pack with him they could have lured one of the big stags away and had enough meat for days.

 

But he wasn't here for that.

 

He wasn't here to hunt.

 

Derek crept closer to the edge of the treeline, keeping low to avoid being seen, downwind to avoid any of the deer balking at a predator's scent. He came closer, inch by inch, until he could see the inhabitants of the clearing without obstruction.

 

There they were. The young adults of the herd, clustered together on one side of the clearing in knots of fives and sixes. The wolf's eyes roamed from group to group, looking at the does and the smaller stags, the betas with their smaller antlers and slighter frames.

 

Deer were pretty things, he thought. Most of them were smaller than his kind, neither as tall nor as broad, but still larger than dogs and foxes. Their bodies were lithe, their legs shapely and built for running, stomachs toned, but still so soft-looking compared to wolves. They had pretty coloured fur too, shades of warm brown and cream that almost sparkled in the sunlight. Their eyes too were pretty – large and round, framed with long dark lashes.

 

Soft, pretty things not made for hunting or killing. They had no claws for ripping, no fangs for tearing flesh. The stags could be dangerous, with the sharp tines of their antlers, but he wasn't interested in the stags.

 

Thinking of pretty things, the wolf's eyes caught on one particular group of does. A small group, five of them in a ring, sprawled out on the grass to soak up the sunshine and picking tiny wildflowers. There was one, a smallish doe with a reddish-brown pelt, that made him pause. She had plush lips and a wicked glint to her smile as she spoke to her companions, a quiet comment that made the group laugh. She tipped back her head to laugh with them, her teeth white and even, and kept smiling as someone called to her from another part of the clearing.

 

A sixth deer joined the group, walking up to them on long, coltish legs. The newcomer was tall and lithe, his body toned, neck long and slender. He had large, dark eyes rimmed in lashes just as long and dark as the reddish-brown doe, his mouth pink and plush. Small horns grew at his hairline where other stags grew a rack of antlers, the difference odd enough to spark the wolf's curiosity.

 

Derek stuck his nose in the air and breathed in deep, concentrating hard to separate the smells carried to him on the breeze. Alphas, all male, beta females and their omega counterparts – practically no different in deer except for their mating cycles. And there, a scent somewhere in between, too sweet to be an alpha or beta, but too masculine to be a doe.

 

An omega stag.

 

He stared at the omega, now seated with the does and twirling a tiny yellow flower between two long, slender fingers. The omega was pretty – as pretty as any of the does – only with male features and a slim male body. He'd get wet like a female, his body made to be receptive to other males.

 

_Other stags_ , Derek's traitorous mind whispered in his ear, sounding like a voice he remembered from years ago – gleeful in its cruelty. _He's built to get wet for other stags, not for you_.

 

The wolf's mood, previously mild, plummeted to something dark and dangerous. He backed away from the treeline, careful not to give his presence away, until he was far enough away that nobody would hear his footsteps in the dry loam.

 

 

* * *

 

 

**Now**

 

Derek's den was in a part of the forest that was totally unfamiliar to Stiles. The cave sat at the base of a horseshoe shaped rock formation just a little bit too small to properly be called a cliff. It was sheer on one side, its edges curled around a large, open clearing. The other side was a gentle slope, as if some time long ago part of the hillside had just crumble away into nothing.

Or maybe, given the near perfect symmetry of the horseshoe and the boulders conveniently formed into a neat ring around a firepit in the centre of the clearing, some industrious herd or pack had carved it out themselves in ages long past.

 

It was an easily defensible home ground, its shape making it almost impossible for anyone to sneak up from behind.

 

There were more caves than the one Derek had made into his den. Two to the right and one to the left, each of them inhabited by members of the alpha wolf's pack. It was a small pack, with only four others aside from Derek himself, but to Stiles even that small number of predators seemed unreasonably dangerous. Derek had promised that none of them would try to hurt him. Still, it was hard to get past the fact that he was a lone deer amongst a handful of wolves.

 

Stiles peered out from the relative safety of Derek's cave with a mix of wariness and curiosity. He'd been promised introductions, damnit, and he wasn't about to wuss out now. And he still had a garden to see, something he couldn't do unless he actually ventured outside the alpha wolf's den.

 

He could see the pack now, the four of them lounging around the firepit in various states of repose, completely at ease in the heart of their territory.

 

Stiles wavered, lingering survival instincts telling him that venturing out into a pack full of wolves was maybe not the best idea for a defenceless omega stag such as himself. Even if he was in the company of the pack's alpha (covered in the alpha's scent, his body pleasantly sore from the alpha's earlier attention), who had promised him safety.

 

Said alpha was looking at him with fond amusement, as if he were quite aware of the dilemma the deer was facing. "They wont bite," Derek told him, glancing over to the members of his pack in clear warning as if to remind them. "They promised."

 

"Easy for you to say," Stiles muttered, but followed the wolf out into the clearing anyway.

 

As soon as he left the shadow of the cave the wolves fell silent and four sets of eyes locked onto him, each one a different shade of amusement or curiosity. Derek led him to the fire pit and sat on his haunches, waiting for Stiles to settle on the ground beside him. The deer did so, scooting close to the alpha wolf's side, aware that his every move was being watched and scrutinised by the members of Derek's pack.

 

"So," one of the wolves drawled, his voice smooth and oily with amusement, "I see you finally found yourself a pretty little deer. You did say you were going to. I suppose I should have believed you."

 

"Yes," Derek replied flatly, eyeing the wolf that had spoken with disapproval, "you should have. Stiles," he said, placing a hand on the deer's shoulder and gesturing to the wolf as he spoke, "this is my uncle, Peter. Feel free to ignore anything he says. He thinks that because he watched me grow up he has the right to say whatever he wants, whenever he wants."

 

"I don't _think_ I have that right, nephew," the wolf replied, a smirk on his lips. He was noticeably older than the rest of the pack, his blue eyes sharp with intelligence and accented by fine lines, his fur a mix of dark grays. He was more wiry than bulky, sinewy limbs covered in scars from claws and teeth. Despite those scars he was a handsome creature, and Stiles could see the familial resemblance between him and Derek. "I _know_ I have that right," Peter finished, his smirk lengthening to show a hint of fang, "elders know best."

 

A blonde-and-tan wolf, the only female of the pack, snorted in derision. "Being older doesn't mean you know anything," she told the gray wolf, " _you_ thought he was joking. We knew better."

 

"I never said I thought he was joking," Peter replied airily, "I said he surely couldn't be serious about expecting to find a deer that shared his unique proclivities. That is not the same thing."

 

"Whatever," the female wolf rolled her eyes. She turned to Stiles and leaned towards him, stretching out an arm to offer him her hand in an unfamiliar gesture. "I'm Erica," she said, not bothering to wait for her alpha to introduce her. "I'm queen bitch around here."

 

"By virtue of being the only bitch," another young wolf, his fur tan and oddly curly, muttered under his breath.

 

"Shut up, Isaac. I'm amazing." Erica tossed her long blonde mane and smiled winningly, hand still held out palm-up towards Stiles, obviously waiting for him to take it.

 

Stiles eyed the tan coloured hand in front of him, his focus drawn naturally to the sharp claws that tipped each finger. Claws that could part his skin so easily, that could gut him and tear him apart with little effort. He reached out, not entirely sure what exactly he was meant to do here, only to have Erica's hand grab onto his and give it a firm clasp before releasing him again.

 

"Well," Stiles said, still a bit baffled by the odd hand-clasp gesture (clearly a wolf thing), "I am amazed."

 

"Ooh, I like him!" Erica grinned, exposing wickedly sharp teeth, and settled back against the silent fourth wolf – a mammoth creature with glossy brown fur and dark, intelligent eyes. "He compliments me," Erica finished, casually tucking herself under the silent wolf's arm to curl into his side. "Good job, Derek. Boyd and I approve."

 

"My other betas," Derek informed Stiles dryly, nodding towards them, "Erica, Boyd, and Isaac. Erica is impatient about everything except hunting. She'll walk all over you if you let her."

 

"You all love it," Erica claimed, completely unashamed of her alpha's assessment of her.

 

Boyd smiled slightly and nudged her side. "Bossy," he murmured, his voice softer and smoother than Stiles would have expected.

 

"And proud of it," Erica confirmed. "Someone needs to be second-in-command, after all."

 

"Excuse me?" Peter drawled, arching an eyebrow at the she-wolf. "What on earth makes you think that would be you?"

 

Derek shook his head but didn't intervene, the bickering obviously a normal part of his pack's dynamic. While Peter and Erica sniped back and forth, their banter punctuated now and then with rumbles of amusement from Boyd, Isaac sidled over closer to Stiles and Derek.

 

"They both know Boyd is actually second," Isaac informed Stiles quietly, his voice low so it didn't disturb the two bickering. "Whenever Derek is gone we all listen to him, he's a good second."

 

"Peter likes arguing," Derek confirmed, sliding an arm around Stiles' waist and leaning in to nuzzle under his ear.

 

"So does Erica," Isaac agreed with a smirk. He looked at Stiles, his expression guarded in a way it hadn't been before. "So... you're an omega, right?"

 

"Yep," Stiles nodded, gesturing to himself with wiggling fingers, "bonafide omega stag right here. I've got the doe-horns and everything."

 

Isaac glanced away, his tail curled up close to his hip and giving small, anxious twitches. "I'm an omega too."

 

Somewhat surprised, Stiles looked at Derek for confirmation since the alpha wolf had called Isaac his beta. The black wolf inclined his head slightly in a half-nod, face serious. Evidently there was some kind of story there. "Ok... Maybe we could talk later?" Stiles offered, knowing it was the right thing to do when he felt Derek's nuzzle and saw the look on Isaac's face – half hopeful and half wary. "There aren't any male omegas in my herd," he added after a moment. "We're not very common."

 

"It's fairly common with wolves," Isaac muttered in reply. "There's... there's usually one or two in every pack."

 

"Derek," Erica's interjection broke the mood, causing all three of them to look at her, "we need you to solve this for us. Who's prettier, me or Peter?"

 

Stiles looked back over his shoulder at the alpha wolf, who was looking at the trio of Erica, Boyd and Peter in fond exasperation. "I'm not qualified to answer that," Derek said flatly.

 

"That's not an answer, nephew."

 

"I think Peter's prettier," Isaac offered, a slightly wicked glint to his smile.

 

"Erica," Boyd stated, earning himself a kiss on the cheek from the blond wolf, "her nose is cuter."

 

"Ah, see, you have to say that," Peter argued, waving a hand through the air for emphasis, "you're her mate. You're not only biased, but if you didn't claim that Erica was prettier she'd bite you. Therefore we can conclude that your vote is being made under duress and doesn't count. In any case we already decided to let Derek choose."

 

"You're my uncle," Derek pointed out blandly. "Erica is like a sister to me."

 

"Haven't you ever wanted to fuck your sister?"

 

"Is that arguing for me being prettier," Erica wanted to know, sounding curious, "or is that you telling us something about Derek's mother that he didn't really want to know?"

 

"Well..." Peter trailed off.

 

Boyd snorted.

 

Derek raised a hand and covered his face. The alpha wolf shook his head. "Why is this my pack?"

 

Stiles couldn't help but laugh. It was impossible not to. Not with Derek looking so long-suffering while the rest of the pack ranged between false innocence (Erica) to unholy amusement (Isaac. And, to a lesser extent, Boyd) and wicked self-satisfaction (Peter). Not when it was just so bizarre for him to see this group of dangerous predators teasing each other and their alpha over the most ridiculous things.

 

How they'd even gotten from arguing over who was second-in-command to who was prettier was beyond him.

 

Part of him had to wonder whether they weren't doing it on purpose – making themselves look less bloodthirsty than usual for the benefit of the prey-animal in their midst. It didn't seem like it though, not with the way Derek seemed genuinely despairing of his pack's inability to make a good first impression.

 

Tapering off into chuckles, Stiles nudged the alpha wolf, inching a little closer to him so that he was leaning fully against the wolf's side. "I like your pack," he said, his words causing a flattering flurry of tail wagging from at least three of said pack. "They seem fun. Anyway, they don't need to do much to impress me. As long as nobody's chomping on my extremities or calling me names then I'm pretty happy with how things are going here."

 

"None of us are going to chomp on you," Boyd said calmly, the most Stiles had heard him speak at all so far (he got the impression that the dark brown wolf was usually the laconic type). "We respect Derek's choice. You're safe with us."

 

"I notice you didn't say anything about calling me names," Stiles pointed out a little cheekily.

 

"Nobody is calling anyone names," Derek said firmly, his tone implying that he wouldn't tolerate anything to the contrary.

 

"Well," Peter drawled half a second later, a slightly mocking pout adorning his lips, "there goes all of my fun."

 

"You'll live." Derek unwound his arm from Stiles' waist and stood from his crouch. "Behave," he said, pointing at his uncle for emphasis. He looked down at Stiles and offered him a hand up, head cocked slightly to one side. "Come on, I'll show you the garden."

 

The omega deer didn't hesitate. He took the wolf's hand and stood, waving a cheerful goodbye to the rest of the pack. "It was nice meeting you," Stiles told them, a little surprised when he realised that was the truth. "For a pack of wolves you seem pretty decent."

 

 

* * *

 

 

**Then**

 

From his perch in the prickly branches of a pine tree, Derek observed the young members of the herd in contemplative silence. He was confident that none of them would notice him, the smell of pine sap was sharp enough to mask his own distinctive wolfish scent. Every now and then wide brown eyes would scan the forest for signs of danger, but none of the deer ever thought to look up – not suspecting that any predators would come from above. Birds of prey were too small to bother the deer, and no creatures large enough to be cause for concern were known for attacking from above.

 

Derek might be uncomfortable in his perch, pine needles prickling against his skin and sap sticking to his fur, but it was worth it to get this close to the pretty omega stag without alerting anyone to his presence.

 

He was beautiful, the wolf thought. Not as small or as delicate as the does, but attractive in his own, decidedly masculine way. He had lips the wolf wanted to taste, and a body the wolf wanted to worship with his hands and mouth.

 

He wanted to mount the omega stag, wanted to spread his pert, round cheeks open and lick his way inside to taste him – as close to eating him as he could get without actually devouring the beautiful creature. He wanted to bite him, to sink his teeth into that lovely flesh and leave marks on his skin, just hard enough to bruise and not to bleed... Derek didn't want to make him bleed.

 

_I'd never hurt you_ , he thought at the omega, eyes greedily drinking in the sight of him. _I just want to keep you, protect you, make you mine..._

Something he couldn't do without first finding a way to separate the young stag from his herd.

 

From what Derek had observed over the past few weeks the omega would be better off away from his herd anyway. It wasn't as if they cared about him, not the way a pack would care for him. In a normal wolf pack, male omegas were just as valued as any other wolf. They had claws like the rest of them – ferocious as any shewolf in the protection of their cubs – even if they weren't as physically strong as other males.

 

The omegas in his mother's pack had been formidable.

 

True, they had still died with the rest of them, but like all the rest they had fought to their last breath. Blood on their teeth and claws, they hadn't gone without a fight. Derek had been proud of them, even as he had howled out his grief with his sisters and uncle.

 

His claws dug into the wood beneath him, sap welling up under his fingertips. The alpha wolf bit back a growl at the memories, not wanting to give away his presence.

 

That part of his life was over with. The past was buried and gone, nothing but bones and dust, regrets like scars under his skin. He'd been burned twice by members of his own species, not counting the alpha who had stolen his first potential mate. Derek had no intention of ever making the same mistake again.

 

 

* * *

 

 

**Now**

 

Just a short distance from the sloping side of the hill there was a shallow, rocky stream winding its way through the trees. The water was crystal clear, its surface deceptively calm – disturbed only by the occasional insect. Stiles didn't even notice it at first, too distracted by the garden growing on the bank closest to the hillside.

 

Stiles stared at it with wide eyes, mouth hanging slightly open. When Derek had said he had a garden he wasn't quite sure what he'd expected to see. Whatever he'd thought, it hadn't been this.

 

Looking at it now he could see just how much effort had been put into its creation. It was small – tiny, compared to the gardens his herd cultivated – but well appointed in neatly kept lines, with stakes and trellises to keep the creepers in order. It was obviously well cared for, the evidence in thehealth of the plants and the lack of weeds.

 

The deer walked closer, fingers reaching out to trail over the nearest leaves, assessing the greenery with curious awe.

 

He could identify several vegetables immediately – string beans on a trellis, silverbeet, a row of leafy green lettuce, and even a small tomato plant – and had to wonder where on earth the wolves would have gotten them from. Stolen from prey animals perhaps? There were a couple of strawberry plants, a small crabapple tree, and a bed of sweetgrass (carefully separated to keep it from encroaching on the other plants). He suspected that the green, spindly plants he could see behind the lettuce were carrots.

 

There was even room for expansion.

 

All in all it was a garden that was easily capable of feeding a single deer. In fact it might have been capable of feeding several, assuming they supplemented their diet with foraging.

 

Wide-eyed, Stiles turned to Derek, the wolf standing almost bashfully near the string beans. "You did all of this?" Stiles asked, indicating the garden around them with sweeping gestures of his arms. "This is... How did you even know how to do it? It's not normal for a wolf to garden, is it? Not to stereotype or anything, but I figure meat eaters don’t spend a lot of time working on their green thumbs."

 

The alpha wolf shrugged, half turning away from Stiles to pluck a stray beetle from a leaf. "I had some time to figure it out... Peter helped."

 

"Really?" Stiles looked around at the plants, trying to imagine the gray wolf working there, claws covered in dirt. He'd seemed ok, nice enough in a teasing, sarcastic sort of way, but it was hard to picture him helping Derek figure out how to grow things. "He, uh, didn't seem like the gardening type."

 

Derek pinched the beetle between two of his claws, cracking its exoskeleton to kill it before flicking the tiny carcass away. "Pests," he muttered, then looked back at Stiles with his bright eyes intense. "He's not. _I'm_ not. But I had to learn and he helped me. That's what pack does. For a while... we were the only pack we had. He understands why I want what I do."

 

"He supports you," Stiles surmised. The deer frowned slightly. He plucked a blade of sweetgrass and rolled it between his fingers, enjoying the fresh, clean scent. "You're pretty close with your pack, aren't you?"

 

"You're not close with your herd."

 

Shocked, Stiles thought about arguing. But really there was no point. Derek had already seen him running from members of his herd. Painful as it was, why argue with the truth?

 

"No," Stiles admitted softly. "I'm not. I'm... sort of the herd freak. Omega stag and all that," he smiled crookedly. "I used to be close with my dad... He, uh, he died last spring. I don't... I don't really have anyone anymore."

 

The wolf was silent for a moment. Then he came forward, moving sinuously between the rows of the garden until he stood directly in front of the omega deer. "You could have me," he offered seriously, placing his hands gently on the deer's shoulders.

 

Stiles wasn't sure what to say. He wasn't ready to commit to answer, not yet, not without getting to know Derek and his pack a lot better than he did now. Instead of saying anything he let the silence hang, fidgeting nervously with his sweetgrass stalk and avoiding the wolf's eyes.

 

"Hey," Derek said, his voice a soft rumble, "look at me?"

 

It wasn't an order or a demand – something Stiles would have ignored on principle just to be contrary – but a request, gently spoken without entitlement or expectation. Not the way alphas usually asked for things. Stiles could have refused, but that gentleness struck a chord with him. He looked up into the alpha wolf's eyes and his breath caught at what he saw in them.

 

Understanding. Like he knew what the deer was struggling with. Derek knew that it was too early for Stiles to really know him, too early to trust him completely... too early for anything but this tentative exploration of what might be.

 

"I'm not asking for a decision," the wolf told him, holding his gaze. His hands squeezed Stiles' shoulders gently. "I just want you to know."

 

He leaned in slowly – achingly slow, allowing the deer plenty of time to pull away if he wanted to – and pressed their mouths together in a kiss.

 

It was chaste, only lips touching lips, but the feeling was somehow intense. Stiles' eyes fluttered shut, his hands suddenly on the wolf's chest feeling the fine, silky-smooth fur that covered his pecs. He could feel the wolf's breath against his face, a soft stirring of air against his cheeks and the catch and rub of the wolf's short-fine facial fur against his own. It should have been terrifying to have a predator's mouth against his skin, should have left him petrified with fear. Instead his heart was pounding for an entirely different reason.

 

And just from one small, chaste kiss.

 

When it broke they were both breathing a little heavier than before. Derek rested his forehead against Stiles', the curve of his skull butting against the deer's small horns. Stiles' fingers twitched against Derek's chest. He took in a shaky breath and heaved it out again.

 

"Fuck," he said eloquently, a little surprised at how breathy his voice sounded. "That was intense..."

 

Derek chuckled, hot breath puffing against Stiles' face. "Yeah."

 

"We are _so_ doing that again," Stiles blurted without thinking, and flushed pink under the cream coloured fur on his cheeks.

 

He wouldn't take it back though. Kissing was definitely a go.

 

Derek chuckled again, his voice dropping low and seductive with his reply; "Any time you like."

 

"Like, all the time. I want all the kisses. _All_ of them. And then," Stiles said, his hands sliding up to the wolf's shoulders and around the back of his neck, "I want to eat some of your plants. And then maybe kiss some more."

 

Derek grinned, his own hands moving to the deer's waist, his tail swaying in a pleased half-circle through the air behind him. "Bossy," he said fondly, leaning in to kiss Stiles again.

 

* * *

 

 

**Then**

 

Hunting could be exhilarating. The chase, the work it took to lure, to stalk and to bring down large game with the pack. Primal focus, sudden violence, the taste of blood fresh from the veins and still-warm flesh – there was nothing quite like it. Still... it could also be dead boring. Creeping through the forest in utter silence, looking for prey to stalk, sometimes took more time than he really had patience for.

 

Derek's pack was small, but five full grown wolves still needed a lot of meat to survive. On the days the pack couldn't, for one reason or another, bring in enough meat to feed them all, snares and traps were a good supplement to their hunting.

 

They only had a few. Basic traps cobbled together from scraps left by hunters and from woven grass ropes. The most simple of them were snares that would leave anything caught in them hanging upside down, able to be left for days before finally their hearts or lungs gave out under the strain. The best of them, the most complicated, was designed to snap closed on any animal unfortunate enough to step on it. That trap was the one most likely to break bones, the force of the snap great enough to tear through the delicate flesh of smaller woodland animals. Which meant it was also the trap the pack needed to check on the most frequently, just in case the smell of blood or the wailing of trapped prey attracted other (unwelcome) predators into their territory.

 

The betas were out checking the snares, possibly to return back to their dens by way of the stream so they could chase fish and splash about like the overgrown puppies they were. (Peter could deny it all he liked, could claim he went along only to make sure none of the 'young idiot pups' drowned, but Derek knew he enjoyed chasing fish just as much as they did.) That left the alpha wolf to check the snap.

 

He could have gone with his betas – Erica had whined at him for being no fun when he'd said he wouldn't – but he had something better in mind for his afternoon.

 

Alone, after checking the snap and confirming that nothing was caught in it, Derek loped through the forest on all fours, tail fluttering excitedly through the air behind him. Closer to his destination he slowed to a trot, and then to a slow slink through the underbrush. The usual clearings the deer herd frequented were a little further away, but often small groups of them could be found foraging in the forest and it wouldn't do to be seen. One glimpse of a wolf and the entire herd could startle, then he'd lose his chance to see the one deer he was looking for.

 

Derek was close when he heard the sounds of a quiet commotion passing nearby. He could hear the mocking voices of several young bucks, their tone unmistakeable but the words indistinct, muffled by the trees. Normally the alpha wolf would have dismissed the sound and carried on, but a familiar scent made him pause.

 

He stopped dead, turning his head towards the unseen bucks' trail he sniffed the air.

 

Deer musk and alpha scent, crushed leaves, and the familiar sweet-but-masculine scent of male omega deer. Only instead of its usual subtly enticing base notes the omega smell was thick and cloying, mixed with hints of something that made the wolf think of sex and rutting. _Heat_ , he realised immediately, mouth filling with saliva at the thought, the omega was in heat. 

 

Immediately the wolf changed course, headed for the omega stag and the group of bucks chasing him. He hung back long enough to hear what they were saying, a pleased thrill tingling down his spine when he realised they were calling out the omega stag's name with their taunts. An odd name, fitting for such a uniquely appealing creature. He got close enough to see the group – the handful of young bucks, all of them tall and handsome with sharp, curving antlers – and how they were following the omega stag, the poor thing becoming increasingly agitated with every step that failed to take him away from the alpha bucks.

 

Suddenly the omega balked, darting off to the side through the trees in a sprint. Derek's mouth pulled up into a grin, his tail whipping from side to side for a moment before he took off after the sprinting deer, dismissing the group of startled alpha bucks as unimportant. At the speed the omega was going he'd outpace them quickly, losing them in the forest. He'd outpace the wolf too, Derek thought, utterly thrilled at the swiftness of his chosen mate, but he had the advantage of being a born hunter.

 

He could follow, dogging the omega stag until he flagged. If he was lucky the omega deer would be heat-addled by the time the wolf caught up, tired and muddled enough to let him close.

 

Then Derek could scoop up his beautiful young deer and take him home to the den where it was safe. He'd see the omega stag through his heat. He'd show the deer that he could be a good mate, that he could be gentle just as easily as he could be fierce. He'd show him the garden, introduce him to the pack so he'd know there was nothing to be afraid of.

 

And then...

 

* * *

 

**Now**

 

Derek was sat on the ground with Stiles straddling his upper thighs, his hands grasping and kneading at the deer's perky, round ass while the wolf's tongue licked into his mouth. He could smell the deer's growing arousal, his own body thrumming with want just enough that the red tip of his cock was starting to emerge from his sheath. Stiles' hips jerked. The deer moaned softly into Derek's mouth, his adorable tufted tail twitching now and then as if it wanted to lift and show off his hole.

 

They were so engrossed in one another, distracted by a growing haze of want, that neither of them noticed Isaac's approach until the young wolf cleared his throat.

 

Stiles broke the kiss with a start, jumping a little in Derek's lap and only kept from falling over by the alpha wolf's hands on him. The deer's head whipped around, eyes impossibly wide, prey instincts anticipating danger. He relaxed a little when he saw who it was, then immediately flushed bright pink when he realised what they looked like, tempted to bury his face in Derek's shoulder to avoid looking at the young wolf who'd interrupted them. (He didn't, though it was a near thing.)

 

Derek growled low in his throat, clearly displeased with the interruption, and glowered at Isaac with fiercely disapproving eyebrows.

 

Isaac coughed and ducked his head both to show submission to his alpha and to hide the small smirk he'd been wearing. "Hunting...?" he prompted hesitantly, gazing at his alpha with big blue eyes.

 

Derek growled again, though this time his irritation had a different tone. He sighed, the mood clearly broken, shoulders slumping just a hair in defeat. "What?"

 

"Erica says if you don't hurry up we'll just go without you," Isaac continued with a half-shrug, discretely observing his alpha and the deer in his lap from under his eyelashes. "She also says we wont bring anything back for you. That's a lie, obviously, but I figure you probably don’t want to deal with another carcass in your bed like last time."

 

The tan wolf's eyes flicked to Stiles meaningfully, the deer's pink flush having fled the moment the word 'carcass' had been mentioned. Derek saw the omega stag's expression and sighed again, dropping his forehead down onto the deer's shoulder briefly.

 

"No," he admitted dryly. "I don’t want that." He looked at Stiles, his hands giving the deer's behind a little squeeze. "I need to take my pack hunting."

 

"Right," Stiles replied, and he was obviously remembering that while Derek had promised him no harm the same couldn't be said for any other prey creature in the woods. "hunting. With the, uh, blood and all that."

 

All living things needed to eat to survive, whether they hunted, foraged, or farmed. There was no changing that. Stiles stroked his palms down the wolf's shoulders to let him know he wasn't truly bothered (or, if he was, that he understood the need of it anyway), then fumbled his way off the alpha wolf's lap. He stood, nearly tumbling over in his haste and amusing both wolves with his lack of coordination.

 

"We clean up before we come back," Isaac offered, just a little too helpfully to not be teasing.

 

Derek shot the younger wolf a warning look as he got to his feet, far more gracefully than the omega stag."Are you ok with that?" He asked Stiles, his voice pitched quiet and serious.

 

Stiles hesitated, looking at Derek's soft, almost pleading eyes. He had a feeling that the question wasn't actually about hunting. Or, well, it was – but it was also about something deeper than that. It was about whether or not Stiles could reconcile being with a creature with a nature so different from his own. Derek was a carnivore. He could eat vegetation if he wanted to, but there was simply no way for it to be a sustainable long term diet for him. He needed to eat meat, and creatures that needed to eat meat needed to hunt. To kill.

 

If Stiles decided to stay with him, to be his mate, he'd have to deal with the evidence of that sooner or later. Heck, he'd already seen evidence of it in the furs that made up the wolf's bedding. Those hadn't grown on trees, but on the backs of bears and other shaggy-furred creatures. He'd seen bits of leather and hide in Derek's den too, and doubtless there would be bone lying about the place too. Maybe not in the den, but wherever in the pack's territory that they butchered and ate their kills.

 

A wolf pack would need to hunt regularly – maybe daily, he wasn't sure – to keep themselves fed. They might be willing to accept a deer into their ranks for the sake of their alpha, but they could never change their natures.

 

It would be stupid of him to expect anything else, cruel to ask.

 

Maybe if he'd still had anyone he really cared about he would have asked them to avoid the herd. Derek would probably agree to that if he asked – there were plenty of other animals in the forest, after all. But Stiles' father was gone, and in truth he wasn't all that attached to anyone else in the herd.

 

_If they ate Jackson_ , he thought to himself darkly, _the world would be better off anyway_.

 

"I'm ok," Stiles assured Derek quietly. He offered the wolf a small, sardonic smile. "I don't exactly want to _see_ it, but I understand you've got to eat. I'm kinda not keen on seeing any corpses or anything though... those are usually bad news for a deer."

 

"No corpses," Derek promised.

 

"But what about –" Isaac started, only to be cut off by the alpha;

 

"We can bury our stores for a while," Derek said firmly. He paused a moment, then looked at the younger wolf. "I want you to stay behind and guard Stiles. Our territory is safe," he explained to Stiles, "or it should be. But there's no point taking risks. Isaac can keep you company until you know the area. Until everyone knows you're with us."

 

"Not to make sure I don't run away?"

 

Derek shrugged, the fur on his shoulders rippling. "If you want to leave, I'll take you. There's a lot of ground between here and where I found you and we're not the only predators in the woods."

 

"Fair enough," Stiles agreed with a sigh. He swung his arms a little, then darted forward and pecked the alpha wolf on the cheek. "Go on. You don't want to keep Erica waiting. I may as well stay here a while, take in the sunshine... I still have to eat anyway."

 

Isaac wrinkled his nose in distaste. "Leaves," he said. "So gross." To Derek he added; "You better bring me back something, alpha. _I'm_ not eating leaves."

 

* * *

 

**Then**

 

Derek heard the cry of pain and increased his step, dodging thick-trunked trees and whip-thin saplings alike with the ease of practice. He could run this part of the forest with his eyes closed – like the rest of his territory he knew it like it was a part of himself – there was no need for caution.

 

His heart was beating fast with adrenaline, his breath coming in short and sharp. Every part of him felt keyed up, his senses heightened, as excited as a pup being allowed to run with the pack for the first time.

 

He'd hoped – in that dark part of his heart that hadn't existed before his sisters' deaths – that it would be like this when he'd noticed the omega stag's trail curving this way through the forest. That Stiles would choose the easy path through the trees where the snap was always laid, waiting under a fine layer of dead leaves. True, there was a chance that the trap could really hurt the deer, but broken bones usually only happened to rabbits and other small, delicate creatures. A fully grown male deer, even one as slight and slender as the omega, would fare better they they did.

 

Either way, broken bones or bruises, Derek would be coming in as Stiles' rescuer. A wolf, come to save the poor creature both from the trap and from the uncomfortable aches of his heat.

 

He slowed his pace near the trail, sauntering casually towards the deer as he surveyed the scene.

 

There was no smell of blood in the air, only distress and heat pheromones muddled by the tang of pain. The omega was still crying out softly, low, instinctual sounds that begged for someone to help him even as he scrabbled at the jaws of the trap with useless blunt claws. The snap was easy for an alpha wolf to pry open – not nearly so easy for such a slender creature.

 

Suddenly the omega stag looked up at him, his eyes wide and frightened, mouth slack and shiny with spit. He looked beautiful, Derek thought. Helpless, innocent.

 

Exactly what he wanted.

 

Derek smiled. "What have we here?"

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Stiles is left alone with Peter, who has some stories to tell in the process of getting to know the young deer his nephew has chosen for a mate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is not necessarily in chronological order. It's also not necessarily the whole truth, and the italics aren't exactly the same as what Stiles is being told either.

“I had a daughter,” Peter said abruptly, his light, unconcerned tone in direct contrast with the sudden admission. “An omega. She died years ago,” the grey wolf continued, his blue eyes watching Stiles carefully for any reaction, “with the rest of our pack. My daughter. My sister. Half a dozen nieces and nephews. There were only four survivors. You see, Derek and his sisters were away from the den that day, and when they came back I was the only one they found who still had a pulse.”

 

The wolf paused then, his lips peeling back into a dark, sarcastic smile, the claw-mark scars on the right side of his face stretching thin.

 

“Wolves have a close relationship with death. We hunt other species, yes, but we kill each other too. When two wolf packs who share a border grow too large, one will attack the other. Sometimes survivors seek revenge – we call it a vendetta, a blood debt.”

 

“Your pack was killed because of a vendetta,” Stiles guessed, feeling a chill crawl down his spine at the thought. “Your family – Derek's family – died as someone else's revenge?”

 

“Yes,” Peter nodded, that unpleasant smile showing a hint of fang. “In fact, they died because of two.”

 

“Deer don't have vendettas.”

 

“No,” Peter nodded again, seemingly pleased that Stiles had said so. “They don't. Deer don't generally kill one another. Deer don't generally kill _anything_ outside self defence.”

 

Stiles opened his mouth to argue otherwise, then stopped. Bullying, gossiping, jockeying for social status within the herd and making outcasts of those who didn't fit in... that was more what herds did. Even when alpha stags fought one another they knew when to stop before things went too far. If Jackson and his friends had caught him they wouldn't have killed him. The omega stag would have walked away from his heat with injuries (bruises, bite marks, welts and tears), but he would have walked away.

 

“You're saying you think he chose me because I'm not dangerous,” Stiles said carefully, thinking it through as he spoke, “because I'm not a wolf I'm not a threat to your pack.”

 

“I'm saying I understand exactly why Derek was looking for a pretty little deer and not a member of our own species,” Peter corrected, finally coming around to the point that Stiles had actually asked him about. “Our pack is small and we've all seen our fair share of suffering. We're outcasts, all of us. I can't speak for the others but _I_ accept you because I know you're good for him. If you were a wolf I'd wonder what you wanted from us. As a deer, an omega deer, your motives are clear.”

 

Stiles raised his eyebrows, giving the gray wolf a somewhat doubtful look. Especially since he himself wasn't entirely sure what his motivation for staying with the pack was past the odd connection he had with Derek and the disconnect he felt with his herd since his father's death.

 

“And what's that?” Stiles asked dryly.

 

“You want a family,” Peter stated simply, “one without expectations of keeping you occupied with pups – or fawns, in your case. You want acceptance. Protection. So far you've found more of both amongst us wolves than you ever had in your herd. Don't look so surprised,” the wolf chuckled, causing Stiles to snap his mouth shut when he realised it had fallen open in surprise. “That's all I want too. It's all any of us want.”

 

* * *

 

 

_A body lay smouldering on top of the fire pit, cooking on the scattered coals even after the fire itself had choked out. Alec, his throat torn open by claws, his fur charred to ash, skin blackened and bubbling._

 

_Smoke choked the air. The sound of howls – triumph and pain._

 

_Malia._

 

_His baby, his daughter, limp on the dirt. Her hands still curled protectively over the mess of meat they'd made of her stomach. Intestines spilled on the ground. Her beautiful eyes – sightless. Staring._

 

_He growled – a sound born of grief and anger, desperation given voice – and pushed himself to his feet again. Bleeding from a dozen gashes, his right eye blinded by his own blood, Peter threw himself back into the fight._

 

_Any fool could see they'd already lost, but he didn't care. The foreign wolves had come down on them too quickly, their ambush too perfect. They might have won, in the process of slaughtering the last of Peter's pack, but he didn't give a damn._

 

_They'd killed his daughter._

 

_And before they killed him too he'd take a few of them down with him._

 

 

* * *

 

 

Once more Stiles woke up in a bed made up of plush furs, feeling warm and comfortable with only the barest of twinges in his lower body to betray the previous night's activities. The deer stretched languidly, working the stiffness from his limbs. Derek was gone from the furs already – Stiles could remember the wolf slipping away sometime close to dawn after pressing a kiss to his cheek – the den itself cool and quiet. This was his third morning waking up in the den after coming out of his heat, and by now the cave was starting to feel less like a large, intimidatingly dark hollow and more like a cosy, comfortable hideaway.

 

After thoroughly stretching, Stiles piled the furs back into their proper order and made his way to the cave entrance. The position of the sun overhead told him that it was early still, only a couple of hours after sunrise. Even so, the clearing outside the den was silent, the pack somewhere away in the woods with their alpha. Hunting, probably.

 

Unconcerned with the where or the why, Stiles meandered out into the large open clearing, face tilted up towards the sun.

 

He felt relaxed here, oddly so given the natural predator-prey relationship between wolves and deer.

 

So relaxed, in fact, that he didn't notice the wolf standing behind him until it spoke.

 

“Good morning.”

 

Stiles jumped. He spun around, nearly losing his balance in his haste to pinpoint the other creature's whereabouts, only to see the gray wolf, Derek's uncle Peter, standing casually just a few feet away. The omega deer's mouth popped open, a curse-word half formed before he changed his mind and went for something much more polite.

 

“Fa–morning! Morning,” Stiles repeated the word with a nod. “Wow, you move quietly. I could swear you weren't there when I walked outside. Were you there when I walked outside?”

 

The gray wolf shrugged, looking slightly amused. “Wolf,” he answered casually. “And no, I wasn't. Derek took the puppies for a run,” Peter added, inclining his head slightly in the direction of the forest and answering a question that Stiles hadn't had the chance to ask yet. “They'll be back before noon.”

 

Stiles glanced in the direction of the forest, the trees as silent and peaceful as they always were. In the few days he'd been with the wolf pack he'd gotten used to the idea of at least one of them always being around. Not always in close quarters, but around – within shouting distance in case the deer got himself into some kind of trouble.

 

Or, as a herd animal used to constantly being surrounded by his peers, in case the omega stag simply felt like having some company.

 

“Were you volunteered to stay behind?” Stiles asked the gray wolf curiously. He hadn't had much of a chance to interact with Peter one on one and wasn't sure what to make of it that he, instead of Isaac, had stayed behind while the rest of the pack were away.

 

“I volunteered myself,” Peter told him, an easy smile on his face. “I thought it was time I got to know the creature my nephew wants for a mate... Assuming you feel the same about him, of course.”

 

Stiles felt himself flush and knew that the blush would be visible under the fine, cream-coloured fur of his face. “Uh, yeah,” he shifted awkwardly, arms swinging, tail twitching with the sudden memory of his and Derek's last coupling. “Early days, but... yeah. I'm, um, I'm leaning towards yes.”

 

Yes because every time he and the alpha wolf touched something sparked under his skin. Yes because the wolf was intense, but he was also sweet and forthright in his intentions. Yes because, despite their very obvious differences, Stiles slept better here in a literal den of wolves than he had in a long while with his herd. He didn't know Derek well enough yet to say with certainty that this was forever, but he was more than willing to see where things went with the wolf.

 

And the sex...

 

Stiles' flush deepened at the thought, his scent no doubt telling Peter exactly what he was thinking about.

 

“No such thing as privacy in a wolf pack,” the wolf drawled, smirking.

 

* * *

 

 

_She looked more like her mother than she did Peter, with her golden-brown pelt and big brown eyes. Her smile, though, and the glint of mischief in her eyes, that was all him. From a distance, golden-brown fur against grey, they looked nothing alike. Up close you could see the resemblance._

 

“ _So, my darling daughter,” Peter drawled teasingly, tail lazily flicking through the air behind him in obvious amusement as he parroted (though heavily paraphrased) his sister's earlier musings, “when exactly can we expect to hear the pitter-patter of little paws from you? You're getting to that age, you know. Fourteen summers and not once have we seen you show interest in attaining a mate. Not that you need one to have pups, though it would be a shame for you to take after your father that way.”_

 

_Malia pulled a face at him, scrunching her nose and sticking out her tongue to emphasize the level of disgust she felt at their Alpha's 'observations'. “Just because I said Aunt Amelia's pups were cute doesn't mean I want any of my own yet.”_

 

“ _Yet. Implying that you do want pups. Shall I start parading eligible wolves in front of you? Do you have a preference of fur colour?”_

 

“ _What if I have a preference for girls?” Malia challenged, baring her fangs in a smug grin. As if she truly thought that would do anything to shut him up. “Girls can't have pups with other girls. Even an alpha female couldn't get me pregnant.”_

 

“ _Then you and your lady-friend can choose a suitable male together,” Peter replied, mirroring his daughter's previously smug look as he added; “You can have him ejaculate into a cup. I'll leave it to you to imagine how the rest of the process might go.”_

 

_The young golden-brown wolf's mouth dropped open in horror. “Dad! Ew!” She hit him (claws in, so he knew she wasn't truly angry), and again when he only laughed at her. “You're so gross. Why can't you be a **normal** dad? Uncle Sean doesn't bug Cora about this stuff.”_

 

“ _Uncle Sean has Alpha Talia to bug Cora for him,” Peter pointed out cheerfully._

 

“ _I hate you so much,” Malia grumbled, though it was clear from the way her mouth twitched, fighting a smile, that she didn't meant it._

 

“ _I hate you too,” Peter replied, smiling at his daughter._

 

 

* * *

 

 

Sun-drenched and peaceful, the stream by the garden was the perfect place for basking after a good meal. Insects chirped, birds trilled in the distance, and Stiles stretched out on the grass with a contented sigh.

 

“You know,” Peter's familiar voice drawled from nearby, “I was only a little surprised when Derek came home with a male.”

 

Stiles cracked open an eye and turned his head slightly to look at the wolf. Peter was standing ankle-deep in the stream, grey fur damp up to his knees and from his hands to his elbows, idly inspecting his claws. “Do I want to know what that non-sequitur is leading up to?” the omega deer asked dryly, “or am I gonna regret asking?”

 

“I'm just saying it wasn't surprising. I know some species have odd notions about that sort of thing.”

 

“Deer aren't one of them,” Stiles replied, propping himself up onto his elbows so he could squint up at the wolf. “Not with omegas, anyway.”

 

“Sensible,” Peter commented with a half-shrug, tail flicking slowly through the air behind him. He crouched down and wet his hands, then ran them over the longer fur on his head, combing the strands into place with his fingers. “Wolves are much the same. Most packs believe it doesn't matter what parts a couple has... as long as its a combination that can produce pups. In our pack, of course, it doesn't particularly matter. Those of us who could have pups have chosen not to, and those of us who can't...”

 

The wolf shrugged, letting the sentence trail off unended.

 

Stiles knew who he meant though.

 

“Derek doesn't want pups,” the deer said after a moment. “And he wouldn't have been able to have them with a doe anyway, so what does it matter that he chose me. That's what you're saying, right? That it's not surprising that he wants someone he can't get pregnant, because he never wanted pups in the first place.”

 

“I didn't say that.” Peter flashed him a very wolfish grin. He carefully combed another lock of fur back out of his face, then stood and flicked water from his claws. “There was a time when Derek wanted an entire litter. When he was younger. When we still had a family.”

 

Intrigued, Stiles sat up properly and tilted his head to the side slightly, eyes narrowed. He couldn't help but be curious. For all that he and Derek had spoken, the black wolf had yet to say much about his past. All Stiles really knew was that Derek had grown up in a large pack, and that something had happened to it. Something that had given Peter the claw-mark scars visible under his fur. The pack now was made up of wolves Derek had found or rescued – outcasts who were either forced out of their old packs or left alone through tragic circumstance.

 

It was actually something that helped Stiles feel at home with them, knowing that he wasn't the only one of them who'd experienced loss.

 

“I suspect Derek decided he wanted to a find a mate who was the opposite of everything he'd ever thought he wanted before,” Peter continued, his almost teasing drawl fading into something genuinely thoughtful, blue eyes looking off into some old memory in the middle distance.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_When he finally found the strength to crack open his eyes it was dark, the only illumination coming from the moon. A mocking crescent in a sky filled with a thousand tiny points of light._

 

_Everything hurt. His head throbbed, a low thrum of pain that pulsed in time with his heartbeat, and the right side of his face felt as if it was on fire. He lay on the ground, his body cushioned by soft, dewy grass. Someone had groomed him. Or they had at least washed the blood from his face. The last thing he could remember before he died was looking into the snarling face of a foreign wolf, half blinded by his own blood._

 

_Peter had thought he was dead. He'd thought he'd died back there with the rest of his pack, his family._

 

_Evidently, he was wrong._

 

_Without moving an inch the grey wolf scented the air, his mind so occupied with pain that it took far too long for him to separate out the individual smells in the bouquet. Grass, earth, a faint clinging hint of smoke. And three familiar scents. Only three. His sister's pups, their own unique scents disturbed by a cloying overlay of grief and exhaustion._

 

_There should have been more. The pack scent should have filled the air – a score of wolves each adding another layer to the pack den – the smell of warmth, home, and family. The foreign pack had attacked, he'd seen them kill, but others had still been alive before Peter had fallen. There had to be more than this. Cora had run off into the woods after a fight with her mother. Derek and Laura had gone to find her. They hadn't been there for the ambush, but surely Peter couldn't be the only other wolf who had survived?_

 

_A whine, weak and cracked, clawed its way up from his chest and out his throat._

 

_Faces filled his vision. Cora, small and fierce, her eyes burning with anger under the sadness. Laura, visibly wilted, a pinched look of exhaustion on her face, the long fur on her head stringy and matted with sweat. And Derek, his eyes red-rimmed from tears and guilt. Two alphas and one omega. And Peter, a beta too wounded to even drag himself upright. All that was left of their pack._

 

“ _I'm sorry,” Derek said, his voice thick and choked with emotion. “I'm so sorry. I thought she wanted to be my mate. She said her pack was small, that they wanted to join us...”_

 

“ _I believed her too,” Laura told him softly._

 

“ _You were stupid,” Cora glared at them both. “You were stupid, and now everyone's dead. You were **so** –” she broke off suddenly and looked away, scrubbing tears from her eyes. She sniffled, both of her siblings silent while the young wolf tried to regain her composure. Finally, after angrily wiping away her tears, Cora looked down at Peter. “But it wasn't their fault,” she insisted._

 

_Peter blinked, his thoughts moving at a crawl as he digested everything his nieces and nephew had said. He felt slower than usual, his normally sharp mind drowning in a maze of hurt both physical and emotional. Tired and in pain, it took him a while to parse what exactly must have happened._

 

_His normally level-headed nephew had met a she-wolf that had convinced him she wanted to be his mate. His niece had, at some point, met this she-wolf and saw nothing amiss. And then, presumably after gathering information about the pack that she supposedly wanted to join, the she-wolf's own pack had instead attacked._

 

_The she-wolf had seduced his nephew as part of a ploy to take down their pack._

 

 

* * *

 

 

“Maybe you shouldn't be telling me this,” Stiles suggested a little reluctantly. He wanted to hear it, but he also couldn't help but think that Derek ought to be the one who told him about his past.

 

_If_ the black wolf decided to tell him at all.

 

The past was what had made the alpha wolf into the creature he was today, but it wasn't like it was something Stiles _needed_ to know. Just like Derek didn't _need_ to know about Stiles' past. There were things the deer wasn't comfortable talking about – with him or with anyone. Old memories. His mother's death back when he was still a fawn. The fever of her mind that had made her hate him. The months afterwards when his father hadn't even been able to look at him and Stiles had been forced to fend for himself in a herd that abhorred weakness.

 

He'd tell Derek one day, assuming he decided to take the wolf as his mate and stay with the pack forever, but not yet. He wasn't close to being ready to talk about it yet.

 

“If Derek hadn't wanted me to tell you terrible, embarrassing stories about his past he wouldn't have left me alone with you,” Peter said, as if he were stating something perfectly reasonable. “It's my duty as his uncle. Now,” he added, stretching out on his stomach in the grass, his tail a furry banner lazily swaying through the air, “do you want to hear about his tragic love life or not?”

 

Stiles hesitated, his sense of morality warring with his curiosity.

 

It really wasn't much of a contest.

 

The deer pulled his knees up to his chest, wrapped his arms around his legs, and cocked his head to the side in interest. “Fine,” he said. “But if Derek gets pissed about it, I'm telling him it was all your fault and I totally tried to stop you.”

 

“That's fair,” Peter agreed with an approving grin. “He knows what I'm like.”

 

“I'm starting to know what you're like,” Stiles muttered, though he looked at the grey wolf expectantly and motioned for him to hurry up and get on with it.

 

“Derek has had exactly three potential mates in his lifetime – not counting yourself, this is.” The wolf paused for a smile that made Stiles roll his eyes impatiently. “And each of them before yourself had several things in common. They were all female, all wolves, all betas, and all very pretty.”

 

“Gee, thanks,” Stiles huffed, not at all impressed after Peter's earlier claim that the deer was the opposite of everything Derek had previously wanted. “Nice to see what you think of me.”

 

Peter looked momentarily surprised, then he chuckled. “Pretty in a _wolfish_ way, little deer.”

 

“Big white fangs, long sharp claws?” Stiles guessed.

 

“Exactly. All the traits of a capable hunter and fierce protector of their future pups.”

 

“So what happened?”

 

“The first, and least disastrous, was Paige,” Peter began, the words sounding somehow like the beginning of a fairytale. “Derek was only fourteen summers old when they met. Her pack's territory bordered ours and we allowed each other to cross over the edges without fear and apparently both of them had stumbled across the same little gully and had each decided it was theirs alone. At first there was a lot of tail-pulling – you would have thought they hated each other. Until of course suddenly they didn't. They were in love, or so Derek told his mother. They were going to wait until Derek was of an age to start his own pack and then they'd be mated. It was disgustingly adorable for all of six months, and then Paige went and mated a wandering alpha. She'd thought they were only having fun, you see. She hadn't thought that Derek was serious when he spoke about becoming mates. The poor boy was devastated, but at least that time it didn't end in bloodshed."

 

* * *

 

_According to the highly romanticised and heavily edited oral traditions of pack lore, alphas weren't supposed to cry. They were supposed to be strong, level headed, able to withstand anything that life threw at them. They had to be, if they were going to lead a pack. When everything else was crumbling, the pack's alpha was the one thing that stood firm. A rock to cling to in the flood._

 

_At least outwardly._

 

_Peter had seen his sister cry (and howl, and scream in undignified frustration) plenty of times in private, especially back when they were both still pups and Talia was only just learning how to be the alpha she was today. Nobody expected their alpha to be perfect. The only idiots who seemed to expect that were the alpha wolves themselves._

 

_The grey wolf shook his head at the folly of it. He was watching over his nephew from a respectable distance, far enough away to give him his space, but close enough that the pup ought to know he was there. Just in case he wanted to talk._

 

_After all, if anyone knew about potential mates running off with wandering strangers it was him._

 

_Derek sat alone on the edge of the pack territory – the opposite end to the spot where he'd met Paige, staring out into the distance with unseeing eyes. So far as Peter could tell he hadn't shed a single tear, though his shoulders drooped and his tail hung limp behind him. He hadn't spoken either, instead choosing to wallow in his misery in silence._

 

“ _You can tell mom I don't want to talk about it,” Derek piped up sullenly, as if he'd heard Peter's inner musings and deliberately chosen that moment to speak._

 

“ _Oh, Talia didn't send me,” Peter corrected his nephew, casually sauntering closer now that the younger wolf had acknowledged his presence. “In fact, our alpha thought you might prefer to be left alone. Though since you mention it, I **do** have ears and I **am** capable of using them.”_

 

“ _You can go use them somewhere else.”_

 

“ _I thought I'd use them here.”_

 

“ _...I don't...” Derek trailed off, looking away from the other wolf and crossing his arms defensively. “I just... Why would she...?”_

 

_Peter shook his head again. He sat down beside the younger wolf, close enough that their shoulders bumped together. They were almost of a height like this, and the black wolf not done growing yet. He'd be tall, when he was grown. Taller than Peter was, that was for sure._

 

“ _Derek, my dearest nephew, you're too young to be miserable,” Peter sighed, nudging the younger male. “You don't have the bone structure for it. One day, when you've grown into your eyebrows, I'm sure you'll look very handsome brooding off into the sunset. Right now you look like a furry trout.”_

 

“ _What?” Derek choked, head whipping around to stare at the older wolf incredulously. “Aren't you supposed to be trying to make me feel better?”_

 

“ _What idiot gave you that idea?” Peter asked. “Do they know me at all?”_

 

_Despite himself, the younger wolf cracked a smile. It was small and brittle, but Peter would count it as a victory._

 

* * *

 

“Two years later came the second,” Peter continued, his voice going dry and oddly flat. “A very beautiful blonde beta... She used Derek to gather information about our den's vulnerabilities. Her pack slaughtered ours.” A beat. “As you can imagine, it was a bad break up.”

 

Stiles sat there, mouth hanging open in stunned silence, completely unable to think of anything to say.

 

The grey wolf gave him a small, sarcastic smile. “We didn't do too well after that, the four of us who survived.”

 

“Shit,” Stiles blurted, hugging his knees closer to his chest as he imagined how the black wolf must have felt. “That's – just... fucking awful.”

 

“Oh, it gets better. The third...” Peter paused, eyes going glazed a moment before he shook himself out of it and continued. “Jennifer came to us alone and scared. Her pack had been torn through by rivals wanting their territory, just like ours had just a few short years ago. She'd run from the fight, she said, and kept running until she couldn't run any more. She was lost, she didn't know if anyone else had survived, and she had no idea how to get back to where she came from. We were nomads at the time, our little pack of four, but we took her in just the same...”

 

Stiles winced, pretty sure he had an idea of where this story was going. The deer at least knew it obviously didn't end well.

 

“She was a sweet little thing,” the grey wolf said, “with a charming naivety. It took her a while, but soon enough she had Derek wrapped around her little finger. We were happy for him, happy to finally have something good again.”

 

“And then...?”

 

“Jennifer started to lead us south. Slowly, subtly, she steered us back towards her old territory over the course of several months. She knew exactly how to get there, you see, and she had a plan for when we got there. She wanted Derek, the big, strong alpha that he'd grown into, to kill the alpha of her pack. Her pack, which had never been attacked, never had any rival packs to speak of. She was insistent, claimed that he was a brute who didn't deserve a pack to terrorise.”

 

“But Derek said no,” Stiles guessed.

 

Peter nodded. “Derek said no. He said no, and Jennifer backed down. Days later, while Derek and I were out hunting, she killed one of his sisters, Laura. When we returned she had Cora, Derek's other sister, my niece, by the throat. She'd kill her too, Jennifer said, if Derek didn't go back there and kill the alpha.”

 

* * *

 

 

“ _I'll do it,” Jennifer hissed from between her fangs, her pretty face made ugly with rage, “I'll slit her throat and you can watch her drown in her own blood.”_

 

_Cora gasped for breath, her claws sunk deep into the other wolf's forearms as she tried desperately to stop the beta from choking her. She stared at her brother and uncle with wide, angry eyes, silently urging them to attack and kill the other female._

 

“ _You wont leave the woods alive,” Derek told her, his pale eyes cold._

 

“ _Neither will your sister,” Jennifer laughed, and dug her claws in. She ripped her hands from Cora's throat._

 

_Blood sprayed from the wound, droplets flying through the air to land on Derek's face like tears. Peter was moving before he even registered that the wetness he felt on his own fur was his nieces' blood, teeth bared in a wretched snarl as he leapt for the pretty brown wolf who'd just killed Cora. Derek got there a split second before him, his teeth aimed at his former lover's throat while Peter went in low with claws aimed at Jennifer's stomach._

 

_In the end they never were sure which of them had made the killing blow._

 

* * *

 

 

“Our pack of four had been reduced to two,” Peter finished. “And soon after that, once we'd found this lovely patch of land and begun collecting a new pack of outcasts and cast offs, Derek decided that it wasn't another wolf that he wanted – but a deer instead.”

 

“Me,” Stiles summed up, and the both of them fell into silence.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Blood matting the fur from his chin all the way down to his chest, Derek stared dispassionately at the corpse of the wolf he'd thought himself in love with. He could still taste her, teeth and fangs stained red. He'd torn her throat out but her face was still pristine, her mouth slack and eyes locked open._

 

_The rest of her was a mess. Cora's blood on her hands. Stomach ripped open and intestines spilling out onto the forest floor. A pile of meat in the shape of a betrayer._

 

_Cora's body was close by, Peter kneeling on the loam beside his niece, head bowed and eyes closed in mourning. If Derek ignored the blood and the gaping wound in her throat then she almost looked peaceful, the constant anger she'd carried in life gone from her face._

 

“ _We'll bury her,” Derek said, his voice sounding flat and strange to his own ears. “And Laura. We'll bury them both. They deserve better than being food for carrion.”_

 

“ _And her?” Peter asked dully, twitching one bloody hand vaguely in the direction of Jennifer's corpse._

 

_Derek cocked his head to the side, looking down at the body of the pretty brown wolf. Her torso was a mess already, organs tainted, but her arms and legs were salvageable. She didn't deserve burial, didn't deserve respect... and if they didn't, he thought to himself, some other creature would._

 

“ _We can take her legs,” the black wolf said eventually._

 

_Peter looked at him, his face blank, blue eyes glassy. They sharpened slowly, the grey wolf's lips peeling back into a cruel smile. “Leave the rest of her for the birds.”_

 

_It was all she deserved._

__

 


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles realises that he's already made a decision. The reaction is fairly predictable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter bumps up the rating from 'mature' to 'explicit' as I dust off my writing spectacles and attempt to give you all some smut. This chapter is also the most chronologically linear of the lot so far, with only one tiny little flashback.
> 
> Also I feel like I should thank everyone who's commented or left kudos so far - I have a hard time replying to comments due to anxiety, but I assure you that I appreciate every bit of feedback that I get.

A month was a short time in the grand scheme of things. A single cycle of the moon, a small segment of the year. Handfuls of days that blended together - a month seemed to go by so quickly.

It had only been a month, Stiles thought to himself, and already he'd made his decision. To be honest he'd made it a lot sooner than that. It's just that it had seemed more sensible to wait, to see if the wolf pack was only playing at being on their best behaviour or if there was anything he really ought to know before he made his mind up. And maybe, just a little, it had been to see if he'd miss his herd at all.

When he hadn't, when the wolves had joked and laughed and rough-housed in front of him but kept to their compromise of not killing where he could see, the decision had been made obvious. Derek's den was warm, the wolves' territory was safe, and the garden by the stream was both peaceful and bountiful. He'd found fast friends in the pack - Isaac and Erica especially, but Boyd too once Stiles had realised that his laconic nature didn't mean he disliked chatter or silliness. He even liked Peter, who he'd begun to think of as a strange uncle - an opinion the rest of the pack seemed to share. And Derek himself...

Stiles gazed toward the front of their shared den thoughtfully. Late afternoon shadows made the cave seem dark from the outside, but sitting inside on the brushed-clean floor the deer felt safe and comfortable. Like Derek himself the wolf's den only seemed threatening until you saw the inside.

Derek was threatening. He was dangerous. He was bigger than Stiles, had sharper teeth and long claws. His body was powerful, a deadly sort of beautiful that made the omega stag's heart beat fast and his breath come shorter. He was intense. And yet he was gentle with Stiles, honest, and fiercely protective of his pack of misfits. Wolves mated for life, and if Stiles chose he could have that loyalty and protectiveness forever.

If Derek had been a stag there would have been no question.

Even as a wolf Stiles had needed much less time than he'd thought he would.

He was going to do it, he realised. He was going to tell Derek 'yes' and stay with him and the wolf pack forever. A lone prey animal in a group of predators. It was an insane thing to think, but he actually thought his dad would have approved.

 

* * *

 

_"When you find someone," Noah started._

_"Dad," Stiles protested, more than sick of being told 'when' rather than 'if'. As if it were a forgone conclusion that someday he'd just magically change his mind about wanting to bear fawns and suddenly the alpha stags of the herd would seem charming rather than obnoxious. He knew his father didn't mean it that way, but after hearing it from practically every single one of the herd's elders (and a good number of the does) Stiles couldn't help but associate 'when you find someone' with 'when your biological clock starts ticking'._

_"When you find someone," Noah repeated firmly, clearly not about to let the subject drop, "I want them to be someone who sees just how special you are. Don't settle for just anyone. If the stag you fall for doesn't appreciate you, if he doesn't look at you like you're the reason the sun rises in the morning, if he doesn't respect you, then he's not the one for you."_

_"Dad," Stiles said again, softer this time, a fuzzy warmness in his chest._

_"No, listen to me, son. I don't care what he looks like, if he's the strongest alpha in the herd or the weakest beta, he could have a face like the back end of a skunk - I don't care. I just want you to be happy. And we both know," the old stag said wryly, shaking his head fondly, "you won't be happy with anyone who doesn't respect you for you."_

_"Like you respected mom." Stiles smiled, the same sad, wistful smile he always got when he thought of his mother. The same smile his father gave him in return. "I know," the omega stag continued softly. "And yeah, that's what I want. I want what you and mom had - the way you loved her... the way she loved you, you could see it. I wont settle for less, I promise."_

_Noah smiled at his son. He reached out a hand and tousled the fur on the omega stag's head, right above his small horns. "Good lad."_

 

* * *

 

"I have something to tell you," Stiles announced the second Derek stepped through the entrance to the cave den.

The wolf stopped dead, frozen half way between steps with one foot raised an inch off the ground. His face was frozen too, expression unreadable as he stared at the omega stag's face, his pale eyes shuttered. "Okay," he said slowly, voice perfectly neutral, and settled until he was standing to the side of the entrance in a nonthreatening pose. Positioned so that there was nothing standing between Stiles and the exit.

Just in case the deer wanted to run, Stiles realised. Because he was expecting something bad. Because he was expecting Stiles to tell him that he wanted to leave, to go back to his herd like Derek had told him he could if he ever wanted to. Because deep down the wolf didn't really expect him to choose to stay.

The realisation made something in the deer's chest constrict - sorrow at his mate's pain.

Sorrow that he could make disappear.

The omega stag walked smoothly forward until he stood in front of the wolf. He reached up and smoothed his hands over the lighter-coloured fur of the wolf's chest, pressed down to feel his heartbeat, a strong, steady beat beneath his palm. "I've thought about it," Stiles told him, looking up into Derek's eyes, "about being your mate - a lot, I've thought about it a lot and... And I realised something..."

"What?" Derek croaked, trying so hard to keep anything he was feeling from showing through, his hands hanging loosely at his sides as if he couldn't bear to touch the deer if he had to let him go.

"I realised I'd already made my mind up weeks ago," Stiles confessed. He leaned in and gently touched his lips to the wolf's cheek, then to the corner of his mouth. "I want to be with you," he murmured, lips brushing against Derek's as he spoke, "I want to stay with you. Forever. I want a wolf for a mate. I want _you_."

He could feel Derek's heartbeat stutter under his palm. The wolf's breath hitched - a skipped beat before suddenly the wolf's pulse was beating faster.

"You want to be with me," Derek repeated, his voice a deep rumble that came straight from his chest. His hands slid around the deer's waist, the touch sparking goosebumps on Stiles' skin. "You want to be mine. My mate... My Stiles. You'll take my pack? My past?"

"I'll take everything."

"You'll let me protect you?"

"From everything," Stiles agreed, his arms winding around the wolf's neck. "You can kill for me."

"I'll kill for you," Derek growled, his nose bumping against the deer's jaw, tongue flicking out to taste the side of the deer's neck. "I'll eat anyone who hurts you."

Teeth scraped against his throat, sharp but gentle and followed by a wet tongue against his jugular. Breath ruffled his fur, hot and moist, smelling of meat. He should hate that smell, should find it repulsive, but instead he found it comforting, a feeling of safety to underly the pulse of arousal that throbbed through his veins. The sudden rush of it was dizzying, a want so fierce it was all he could do to hold on. It was always like that with the wolf, the intensity of Stiles' want for him bordering on desperation.

Big hands tipped with sharp claws held him close, one splayed against this back and the other on his ass, claws prickling the sensitive skin beneath his tail. A rumbling growl punctuated the next gentle bite to his neck, a happy noise almost like a moan. He knew Derek could smell his arousal, the way he was starting to get wet for the wolf, his body signalling that he was getting ready to be mounted.

Stiles tilted his head back further, exposing more of his throat to the predator holding him close.

His Derek, his wolf, dangerous and beautiful and so, so gentle.

He'd claimed the wolf as his mate and been verbally claimed in return. Now he wanted more. The instinctual need for physical bonding rippled through his body and made his hole wet and his cock emerge from its sheath.

"Come on," Stiles breathed, his hands clutching the shaggy fur at the back of the wolf's shoulders, back arching as he tried to press their bodies closer together. "Derek - I need you. I need you to -"

"Fuck, you smell so good," the wolf rumbled in return, nose nuzzling its way up the side of the deer's neck. He kissed Stiles' jaw, then his mouth, tongue dipping between the slack, open lips.

Derek rolled his hips, bringing their bodies together the way Stiles wanted and rubbing himself against the deer's stomach. The wolf was erect already, his cock fully exposed from its sheath and wet at the tip where it dragged against the fur on Stiles' belly. The feel of the wolf against him made Stiles moan, the omega deer's entrance slick and wet with want, his own cock exposed and dripping. His tail was up, the fluffy white underside like an arrow pointing the way. He wanted the wolf in him - wanted to feel that big, thick shaft pistoning into him and the wolf's knot stretching him wide. He wanted to come with the wolf inside of him, bracketed by the wolf's hard body and safely cradled in his big, muscular arms.

One more kiss, wet with shared saliva and full of licking tongues, and Stiles squirmed his way out of the wolf's arms. He backed up quickly, away from the hands that reached out to pull him back, and instead turned around to show the other creature his back. Flashing a coy look back over his shoulder, the omega stag dropped to his hands and knees on the piled up furs that made up their bed. He arched his back, hips pushed up and tilted to show the wolf his hole - shiny and so wet with slick that the fine, thin fur around it was plastered to his skin.

"Derek," Stiles groaned, tail twitching impatiently. "Mount me - fuck me - come on..."

The wolf's deep, rumbling growl made him shiver in anticipation. He felt Derek climb onto the furs behind him and crawl up over his body until the wolf had covered him completely, his arms brushing against Stiles' ribs, the deer's tail folded back under his stomach and the wolf's hot breath against the back of his neck.

"I want to taste you," Derek growl-purred the words against Stiles' fur, teeth grazing lightly against his skin. "Want to bite you - want to eat you."

Stiles' skin rippled with goosebumps, a moan falling from his open mouth. His self-preservation instincts were definitely broken, because rather than worrying him the wolf's words only made him wetter.

He could feel the tip of Derek's cock nudging up against his entrance, dragging through the wetness dripping from him and leaving tingles of pleasure behind and pushed his hips back to try and get it inside. The tip caught against his rim and the next tiny shift of the wolf's hips pushed it inside just a little.

"Please," Stiles practically moaned the word, squirming under the larger body of his lover in a futile effort to impale himself on the thick, dripping organ flirting with his entrance. "Come on, come on - Ah!"

The wolf's hips jerked forwards suddenly, Derek's cock sinking in with little resistance until it was as far in as their current positioning allowed - a little over half of the wolf's big, thick shaft spearing him open. Derek growled, shifting on his knees to get closer before he thrust in the rest of the way. Stiles whimpered at the feeling, cock jerking and drooling thick strings of precome. The wolf was so big - and thick, thicker than any stag would have been - wider at the base where the knot would form. The deer could feel his muscles fluttering around the intrusion, hole spasming as it adjusted to the girth. It was intense. Delicious in a way that had his entire body trembling beneath the broad, muscular body that caged him.

Derek circled his hips once in a slow grind, then pulled back a little only to thrust back in again. A short, sharp thrust that hit the deer's sweet spot straight on. The wolf repeated the motion, pulling out a little before punching back in, creating a rhythm of short, sharp thrusts that jabbed against Stiles' prostate.

Their thighs were flush together, Derek's hips jolting against Stiles' ass with every thrust and making the firm, round globes jiggle. The noise of their coupling was obscene - wet squelching sounds coupled with the fur-muffled slap of skin on skin and mixed with the sounds of gasping moans, rumbling growls and heavy breathing.

Sweat broke out over Stiles' skin, dampening the fur on his back where his lover's hard, furry chest brushed against him. Beads of sweat collected in the dip beneath his tail, everywhere from the top of his ass crack to his inner thighs wet with sweat and bodily fluids. He could feel Derek's balls slap gently against him with every thrust, the fur covering the sack wet with Stiles' own slick that had leaked out around the wolf's cock.

Stiles' skin rippled with a full body shiver, already anticipating the thorough grooming that would follow once their coupling was over. He could practically feel the wolf's tongue against his skin already, lapping at the fluids leaking from his loosened hole - tasting himself, tasting Stiles, grooming and licking - unbearably gentle and perfect. The thought made the deer's hole clench in anticipation, tightening around the wolf's shaft and drawing a growl from his lover's throat.

Maybe this time he'd return the favour, Stiles thought. With his tongue instead of with the woven flax cloth kept by the furs for that purpose. Maybe this time he'd slink down until he could nuzzle Derek's dick, pink and wet and soft where it rested against the wolf's fur. He'd lick it gently clean, soft little licks against the oversensitive organ until he'd worked his way down to the sheath. Then he'd use the flat of his tongue in broad, firm strokes to clean the slick and come from Derek's fur. He imagined the heavy weight of the wolf's balls against his tongue and felt his mouth fill with saliva. He swallowed compulsively, sucking on his own bottom lip in an effort to keep from drooling - too many thoughts, too many sensations making it hard to coordinate his body.

Derek's thrusts began to slow, each push inward just a little more concentrated than before as the base of his shaft began to swell. Stiles moaned at the stretch of it, every push and pull tugging against his rim. He panted, his own hips twitching back and forth in encouragement, eager for the too-full feeling and the way it made his entire lower half tingle. If he concentrated he could feel the wolf's balls pulled up tight, could feel the way the knot pulsed and grew as it got ready to lock inside him.

The wolf's teeth brushed the back of his shoulder, a soft bite that only flirted with the notion of breaking skin, Derek's tongue laving at the fur between his teeth and tasting the deer's sweat.

"Derek!" Stiles gasped out the wolf's name, the sudden hint of pain making his cock jerk and leak another long string of fluid onto the bedding.

The wolf growled in reply, removing his teeth from the omega deer's shoulder just enough to speak; "Stiles... mine... my mate. Pretty mate."

"Yes!" Stiles' hips jerked, a short, sharp sound falling from his lips when the wolf pushed in one last time to lock them together.

He couldn't feel it when Derek started coming inside him, not really, the only cues he really had the wolf's barely-audible whimper and the way his body stiffened, hips hunched forward and pushed tight against the deer's backside to press his knot in as tightly as it would go. The warm flood in the deer's lower abdomen was the feeling of his own orgasm drawing close. His hips rocked back against the wolf, grinding himself back against the fist sized knot, every movement sparking against his prostate and sending warm waves of pleasure through his body.

The deer's mouth dropped open, his eyes screwed shut as he came untouched, come splattering in stripes onto the furs beneath him. It felt like it went on forever, always so intense when Derek was inside him like this, and by the time the waves of pleasure gave way to pleasant tingles the wolf was nuzzling the back of his neck.

With the gentle ease of practice Derek coaxed them down onto their sides on the bedding, deftly avoiding the embarrassingly large wet spot. His arms wrapped around Stiles' chest, holding the smaller male close in a comfortable embrace. The wolf's hips still twitched every so often - just a tiny hitch that Stiles wouldn't have noticed if they hadn't been tied, the wolf's knot just barely nudging against his prostate with every shift.

Stiles made a small noise, his softening cock dribbling out a few more drops of wetness.

"Sorry," Derek murmured, not sounding sorry at all and in fact sounding quite smug.

The deer's lips quirked up into a slack smile. "Sure you are, big guy."

"Mm," Derek replied, snuffling against the back of the deer's neck in a way that Stiles recognised as scenting him. "Love the way you smell."

"Like yours?" Stiles suggested, feeling too content to sound sly or teasing. He placed his hands over the top of the wolf's on his chest, gently stroking Derek's fingers and feeling the sharp tips of his claws. "Like you're mine," he said softly aloud, the idea of it finally sinking in. He'd agreed to be Derek's mate, to stay with him and his pack forever. Derek was _his_. "My wolf."

There was a soft thumping sound, the impact of Derek's wagging tail against the soft bedding.

Stiles smiled, letting his eyes fall closed. He felt calm and sated in the wolf's embrace.

Loved.

Like he was exactly where he belonged.


End file.
